Which Has a Bigger Affect On Your Sex Drive – Age or Lifestyle?

One thing than no one has touched on is sex drives. Mine has gone up with age and I find this to be true of most of my female friends (except for those who never cared for sex in the first place). We’ve also found that men have lower drives as they age. I have a question for the guys who date younger: do you find this to be true? And do you find your sex drive to be an issue with these women who might be used to twenty and thirty something men who want to do it all night? I know about viagra but the desire has to be there for it to work. (I’m not trying to be combative, I’m really curious as this is never discussed!). – Marshmallow

I don’t know if it’s true that men’s sex drives decrease due to age. I don’t think age has as much to do with it as does lifestyle. I mentioned in a post once that one of the main reasons I didn’t date men in a few certain career fields is because much of their job involves either very long work hours, higher than average stress as well as a lot of client coddling. And by that I mean drinking. That, more than anything else, is the main reason I never dated or could stay with someone who was a heavy drinker. Furthermore, I’m also wary of men who use anti-depressants or other medications. Why? Because all of those things affect both their sex drive and their ability to get and maintain an erection.

We’ve also found that men have lower drives as they age.

This possibly might just be another myth created by women to help them soothe their egos because they’ve been rejected. It could be that their sex drive has decreased. I’m sure age does have some affect. But it could also be that these men just didn’t want to have sex with you and your friends because y’all were older.

I know about viagra but the desire has to be there for it to work.

I don’t think that’s how viagra works. Anyone have an answer to this?

And do you find your sex drive to be an issue with these women who might be used to twenty and thirty something men who want to do it all night?

But were those women happy with that amount of sex? Sure, it’s a great ego boost. But who really wants to have sex “all night?” Yeah, in a new relationship you’re all over each other and waking up in the middle of the night or going at it in the kitchen while you’re cooking (so I’ve heard). But that eventually tapers off, doesn’t it?

16 Responses to “Which Has a Bigger Affect On Your Sex Drive – Age or Lifestyle?”

Sex drive does not diminish. Ability to execute can, but that isn’t usually due to age as much as other health factors and the medications to combat them. Where health isn’t an issue, confidence issues due to aging could be more of a factor than the actual functional changes caused by age.

Viagra works regardless of desire (thus its heavy use in the porn industry). Desire and sexual performance are two entirely different things.

I think lifestyle and life issues have much more effect than age. Babies. Unemployment (or underemployment). Stress at work or from social obligations. Excessive drinking, as you mentioned, is a common and easily avoided cause of impotence. So are smoking, weight gain, constantly burning the candle at both ends.

Also, attitude about aging can affect a lot of the issues we think of as inevitable. If you’re convinced you’ll be a broken down, sexless geezer, then that is exactly what will happen. Even doctors are prey to this kind of thinking.

An elderly woman went to see a new (young) doctor about her sore shoulder. He checked herover, and then patted her arm as he said, “you know, things just start to wear out as we get older.”

“Then why isn’t my other shoulder sore? It’s just as old as this one.”

“Viagra works regardless of desire” That is completely incorrect. Erections are caused by dilation of the arteries in the penis, which is a result of cGMP causing the smooth muscle around the arteries to relax. Arousal causes cGMP production to increase, resulting in erection. However, PDE5 destroys cGMP, so as soon as cGMP production stops, the erection ends.

Erectile dysfunction is a result of arteries not relaxing enough to permit sufficient blood flow to inflate the penis. Viagra treats this by blocking PDE5, so cGMP production is magnified and the arteries relax more. However, if there is no arousal, there is no cGMP production to magnify, and blocking PDE5 cannot result in erection.

“(thus its heavy use in the porn industry).” It’s used in the porn industry because actors have numerous orgasms per shoot, and each one is more difficult than the last because the body reacts to orgasm by producing more PDE5, and therefore requires more and more cGMP to produce an erection each time. Since Viagra blocks PDE5, actors are able to recover quickly and get back to work.

OK. Women had certain privileges when they were young. That privilege is a situation where men seem to desire the opposite sex more, and will pursue and chase and cater and spend and flatter and a whole lot more. Testosterone is an insane chemical that does that to a man. It’s absolutely necessary, because if it weren’t there, we might stop procreating at the numbers we need to continue as a species. Those privileges start to disappear as men age and not have those high testosterone levels.

With women as they age, their estrogen-testosterone ratio starts to tip more in the testosterone direction, hence their sex drive increases. This only happens for a while though. It’s the typical results of perimenopause, the typical 10 to 15 year period before actual menopause. It’s nature’s way of telling women that it’s now or never to have a child. After menopause, women start the slow decline just like men and it’s actually worse because men had more testosterone to begin with, in the first place, hence the 70 year old man seeking sex more than the 70 year old woman.

Now those numbers I threw out with menopause and perimenopause are just average numbers. Perimenopause could be very short, as little as a few years and menopause can come even in a woman’s thirties rather than late forties or after 50. A man’s testosterone levels seem to decline after 28 but there are variance here especially at the rate of decline. A lot of these variances are blind luck, genetic, nutrition, lifestyle and environmental issues.

The environmental issues are especially troubling. Genetically modified foods seem to have a negative effect. Plastics seem to have a negative effect. The coating on frying pans, detergents, petroleum products and many of the chemicals we come into contact with, seem to have a negative effect. With nutrition, the lack of enzymes in our food seems to have a negative effect, a terrible price for all the processed and over cooked foods we eat. While fertilizers have produced bountiful yields, the nutritional value of our foods seem to have declined tremendously because of land overuse, insufficient crop rotation, and the slow extinction of hybrids from our food sources.

But regardless of all this I just threw at you, the human mind and behaviors are powerful factors in the equation of determining how much one desires the other sex. And what happens there is very individual. However, emotions and maturity are clearly the solutions to overcoming all these differing levels of sex drives at various ages.

This is a great response. I’ve also read that estrogen in the water supply (from improperly disposed of birth control pills) has an effect on men as well. I think lifestyle explanation also makes the most sense as these are rough times. It’s odd for me, though, to read about married people who have sex like four times a year if that. Often, one person is unhappy with this but they can’t do anything about it.

I am 50and date men in their 50’s – I also think issues in bed aren’t related to age, but instead to lifestyle issues including obesity, smoking, excessive drinking as well as anti-depressants. The best thing that happened to my sex drive was my kids are growing up. Have more time to focus on me, go to tthe gym, by cute clothes, and date..so, agree with poster that my sex drive has definitely increased with age. Not sure if I would have seen the same pattern if I didn’t have kids..

“[My sex drive] has gone up with age and I find this to be true of most of my female friends … men have lower drives as they age.” Numerous studies of sex drive place the male peak around 19 and the female peak around 34. So, assuming you’re dating men over 19, yes, their sex drive is declining. OTOH, if you’re over 34, yours is too–but perhaps you don’t notice that because the men you’re dating have a 15-year head start on that decline, or because there are other factors in your life (eg. kids, work, health) that have caused yours to be abnormally low and it’s just now rising to where it should have been all along.

I’m 38 and my drive is double what it was at age 28. It has nothing to do with age it has everything to due with how I feel about my body. I was overweight in my 20s, ashamed and embarrassed to show wiggly thighs and a squishy tummy to anyone. When I turned 31 I dropped 60 pounds. Having a new body that I was proud of brought confidence that was never there before. When I stopped worrying about what I looked like naked I could focus more on the pleasures of sex – boosting my drive.

Generally as people age they tend to feel more comfortable in their skin and learn to accept their imperfections. I think people also gain the confidence to ask for what they want (in and out of bed) without worrying that they’ll be judged or rejected.

I did date a woman who was extremely hot, actually the hottest and sexiest that I had ever dated. Here I was, thinking that my sex drive was declining with age, but I found myself performing like I never had before in my life, in duration and frequency and strength of erection. I was even surprised by myself. She actually asked me once: did I take a pill? I never have, incidentally.

So at least for me, it came down to sexual attraction. When I am in a bad point in my life, or dating someone that I am just not that into sexually (even though she has a wonderful personality), the libido is far lower.

That’s just me. It’s different for other guys. Us men are such complex beings!

A promiscuous friend of mine back in my college days could get it up for anything. In fact, he once was not able to, because the woman was not that attractive to him at all. He freaked out and went to a urologist, who of course found nothing wrong with him. I thought it was hilarious. Fast forward to today, and his promiscuity has really screwed up his view of sex and relationships. What goes around comes around.

I think it’s true that a man’s sex derive often declines because his testosterone levels decrease and are replaced by estrogen!! Isn’t that wild.

For me, I’ve never been a woman with a huge sex drive and can go quite a while without sex when I don’t have a man in my life. I am not saying that I don’t get horny, because I do, but I kind of have to keep sexual thoughts on the brain (thank goodness for online porn) LOL!. I hope I am being clear.

By the way I am 46 yrs old. I think my often lack of sexual drive is more emotional than physical. I was sexually abused as a child and eventhough I’ve worked through my roadblocks with sex in therapy, my bigger hurdle is with emotional intimacy which I think impacts on my ability to go without sex for long periods of time.

This is certainly true in my case. Although I still have my moments, I am nowhere near what I was like at 18-25 when I was able to do it 4 times in one night. And you know what? I’m okay with that. It’s liberating not being a complete slave to my hormones as I once was. Lifestyle also has something to do with it. When you’re a single guy, nothing get’s you hotter than the prospect of new pussy. But when you’re in a long-term exclusive relationship and it’s always available as well as being the same person over and over again, a man is simply not going to have that same level of desire as he will when he never knows when his next lay will happen and has the urgency to find someone new.

I know about viagra but the desire has to be there for it to work.

Correct. Viagra causes erections only during sexual excitement. It does not work in the absence of arousal. Viagra gets the blood flowing, but your brain has to be in the mood as well. The biggest misperception is that it changes your psychology and makes you want sex. But if you’re sitting talking to Grandma and you pop a Viagra, unless you have issues, nothing’s going to happen. Because Viagra doesn’t increase desire, it’s not prescribed for men with desire disorders, such as a low sex drive.

And do you find your sex drive to be an issue with these women who might be used to twenty and thirty something men who want to do it all night?

When I was a single, the twentysomething women I dated had a lower sex drive than older women. With exception of one nympho I dated when she and I were both 24, the women I’ve dated who were the most hot to trot have always been mid 30s or older. The 35+ years old ladies have always been comparatively much better in bed as well. I swear I couldn’t keep up with some of them. So really if I guy is worried about keeping up with a woman’s performance expectations, he’s better off going younger than older actually. An older woman not only expects it more often, but you’d damn sure better be good too. If you don’t make her come, you’ll be gone.

“When you’re a single guy, nothing get’s you hotter than the prospect of new pussy. But when you’re in a long-term exclusive relationship and it’s always available as well as being the same person over and over again, a man is simply not going to have that same level of desire as he will when he never knows when his next lay will happen and has the urgency to find someone new.”

I agree with this, except I don’t think it’s so much about urgency as about novelty. I will never be a 17 year old again, but each new relationship for me is rejuvenating sexually which has not really lessened with age.

Sex with same person gets boring. There are other benefits people get from committed relationships – I get it, but the decline in male sex drive (ie desire) is mostly driven by bordeom, not age, in my opinion. As for execution, as Angeline I think says, that’s a different story and obviously age and health can affect the performance aspect.

Urgency goes hand in hand with novelty. When you’re a single guy, you don’t know when or if you will ever get laid again. You thus have a sense of urgency. When you do finally have a new woman naked in your bed for the first time, it’s not just the novelty tha gets you excited. The fact that your sense of urgency has led you to the point of successfully scratching that itch also drives your desire for her. It’s one thing to enjoy a snack when you’re moderately hungry. But when you’ve literally been starving for awhile, the next meal you have is going to be the best one you’ve ever had. That is the effect urgency has on desire.

I don’t think its about urgency. I could be sleeping with and getting my “needs” met with other women and a new woman still gets more sexual attention from me than one I’ve been dating for a while. Desire for me is more about the attractiveness of the woman and the novelty than the general physical need for sex.

Also, my point was just to explain what women perceive as “declining sex drive” is really just mostly boredom. If it was just about urgency, there would be no decline over time. There would be an initial decline in drive, but then a plateau over time after that. Women are perceiving decline over time.

Speaking for older women, I am not agreeing with sex decline after 34? really? Mine has increaed with age due to less responsibilities, not having to worry about pregnancy. I indulge myself more such as working out & doing things for myself. I’m sure its more to do with your mental as much as it is physical.